View full sizeIn the basement of the Pittock Block there is a room that contains the major internet hub for the entire region and on the same wall where the fiber-optic comes through are an assortment of newspaper photos from the early 1900's glued to the walls and a small gallery of pin up girls. The two live side by side representing an era gone by and one looking forward.Kraig Scattarella/The Oregonian

"Somewhere in Portland, there's a very old building, and that very old building has a very, very old basement. An incredible basement, a video-game-level basement, a set-decorator's dream basement."

Home to the city's first electrical substation when it opened 98 years ago, the eight-story Pittock building at Southwest Ninth and Washington now hosts a confluence of Internet cables that make it one of the most wired spots in the state. Sasser's software company, Panic Inc., has servers in the building and that's how he came to his underground exploration.

In his blog item, which achieved viral popularity across the country, attracting 40,000 page views by late Thursday, Sasser posts photos that juxtapose the digital ephemera of the Internet age with the enduring visual evidence of a bygone age.

In Sasser's images, faded newspaper headlines glued to the wall testify to occupants' attention to World War I in the first years after the building opened. A note scribbled in blue pencil serves as a receipt for coffee. Scores of pinup girls, clipped from the newspaper, brightened the day of long-ago workers rendered anonymous by time.

History: The site was once home to Henry Pittock, longtime publisher of The Oregonian. Beginning in 1914, it was home to the Northwestern Electric Co. and housed Portland's first electrical substation in its basement.

Cost: Construction of the building cost $1 million. The basement cost an additional $250,000.

Amid all this, Sasser notes, run the fiber-optic cables carrying pulses of light and bits of data from across the continent, and around the world.

The Pittock Block's evolution from a pioneering power plant into a cluster of online connectivity is well documented and well known among Portland technologists. But the basement artifacts were not, and never has the building's transformation been so lyrically conveyed.

"100 years from now, when another one of you goes spelunking around this basement, that data, those bits, today's moments, will likely be long, long gone," Sasser concludes.

"But the women on the wall might still be waiting."

So who pasted those pinups to the wall? There lies a mystery.

In 1914, The Oregonian reported that The Evening Telegram of Portland was in talks — citing “substantial authority” — to rent a corner of the Pittock Block. The Telegram subsequently moved into its namesake building two blocks away in 1922.

View full sizeIn the basement of the Pittock Block, there seems to have been a press room where some sort of publishing was done. Yellowed and peeling, this note left by a worker describes a set of rules that only pressmen could relate to. Kraig Scattarella/The Oregonian

Building managers have long believed The Oregonian used to print its newspaper in the Pittock basement. Headlines plastered on the wall, along with scribbles referring to "pressmen," appear to confirm the tale, which Sasser repeats on his blog.

But historical evidence suggests that the newspaper printed continuously at another site -- the old Oregonian Building at Southwest Sixth and Alder -- from the 1890s until the late 1940s.

Pittock did house other publishers at times -- a 1924 directory lists both the American Educational Association and Western American Publishing Co.

"Fascinating. Extremely fascinating!" Sasser wrote in an e-mail exchange, swapping ideas about who else might have worked down there, and what kind of jobs they were doing.

Then: "One last thought. This one felt urgent," Sasser concludes.

"If you can get anything at all on this in The Oregonian -- preferably with photos -- then there's only one thing left to do. Sneak down one last time with scissors and paste, and complete the circle..."

Oregonian researcher Lynne Palombo contributed to this report. And by "contributed," we mean she did all the research. Which was quite a lot.